Today we hear from Chris Yu (UK delegate) and Peter Mulyono Wijaya (Indonesia delegate) about their experiences of days 3-4 of AMSC 2008.

Tokyo University Lecture Theatre

After 4 hours of sleep, day 3 began with a coach journey to Tokyo University for the paper presentation competition. The UK team of Joon, Myles, Min Hui, Kai Yuen and myself were delighted at the random allocation of being second to present after Pakistan.

The lecture hall was beautiful with its antique style decoration. It was also very spacious for the audience of over 400 people. Anticipation was building up as all the delegates had a copy of each delegation’s paper and were scrutinizing them for the question and answer session. Our presentation went better than anticipated and we were glad to have pulled it off within the 10 minute allocation time!

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Today marks the official opening ceremony of the 2008 summer Olympic games being held in Beijing, China.   To launch the event, we have posted a very interesting, and timely, article on Steroid Abuse in Sport, written by PM Indoe, which we encourage you to take a look at.  Doping controls were first introduced by the International Olympic Committee in 1968, and athletes have tested positive for banned substances in 9 out of the 10 summer games held since then, in some cases resulting in Olympic medals being withdrawn.  It has yet to be seen whether there will be any doping scandals at this summer’s 2008 Olympics, but based on past games, the ‘track’ record isn’t good.Potential doping scandals aside, the 2008 summer Olympics may still be remembered as the most controversial games in decades, marred by protest directed at host country China.  China has received criticism from the international community on a range of issues, including their oppressive regime in Tibet; their ongoing business dealings with the government of Sudan which continues to fund the genocide in Darfur; their appalling human rights record; the pace of pollution and environmental degradation that is occurring there; and the government’s totalitarian control over public information.  They have responded to these concerns with delicate tact, outright denial, or accusations that the Olympics are being ‘overly politicized’. But the Olympics – same as any other major international event – have always been, and will continue to be, highly political, and host cities should expect to face a greater level of international scrutiny.  If the Olympics is intended to be China’s coming out to the world party, political leaders would be apt to heed the message that the international community is collectively sending upon their entrance. (more…)

Nicola Bradley reports from the XVII International AIDS Conference being held in Mexico City this week.

In Mexico City, 21 000 delegates from all over the world have gathered for the XVII International AIDS conference. Speakers at the opening ceremony included Mexican President Felipe Calderon, Ban Ki-Moon, Secretary-General of the United Nations and Dr. Pedro Cahn, President of the International AIDS Society. The conference is the largest to ever be held in Latin America, receiving 11 000 abstracts, 7800 of which will be presented. The second largest group contributing to this number were Latin American and Caribbean papers.

Dr. Cahn warned that currently the world is not on target to keep promises to provide universal access to treatment by 2010. “It appears that we are poised to accept defeat when victory is still within our grasp. Our failure to meet these commitments will have an impact on millions of lives. This cannot be allowed to happen. It is time for nations to live up to their commitments. It is time for universal action, now!” This final phrase was echoed throughout the evening by all speakers, particularly Ban Ki-Moon, who encouraged G8 nations to keep their promises as well as personally committing himself to action stating, “You can count on me”. (more…)

Earlier in June, we published a blog from James Matheson on an event he attended that was hosted by MSF called ‘Friend or foe? Cooperation with private military and security companies’.  Since publication of the blog, Dr. Dominick Donald from Aegis has been in touch with James and asked that we publish his response to the article, which we are happy to copy below:

[excerpts from James’ blog] ….‘Dr Donald spoke next and passionately about why PSCs had an interest in the humanitarian field.’

No, I did not.  I was speaking about COIN and its reliance, if it is to be successful, on ‘soft security’, how states have lost the capacity to deliver ‘soft security’ themselves, and how NGOs - the now-traditional deliverers of ‘soft security’ - are in danger of losing dominance of this ground because of their (entirely understandable and laudable) refusal to be part of a COIN campaign.  In fact, I emphasized throughout that I wasn’t sure PSCs would benefit from this shift, but that I was pretty sure that, thanks to the way the US government is now approaching COIN, NGOs would lose.  

‘…and what they were doing there. He used the example of Iraq to illustrate his point. In post-war Iraq the Coalition leadership had a chart of reconstruction functions including healthcare, education, governance and many others and a timescale alongside them’.

Again, absolutely not.  This diagram is in the latest Stabilisation Ops doctrine.  It puts into concrete form the lessons learned from Iraq - that the NGOs and civil servants wouldn’t turn up in time or on team.  

‘They hoped that these tasks, begun by the military might be taken over and fulfilled by civil servants and NGOs - neither showed up. As a result contractors were called in and here the PSCs found a role. Dr Donald talked about some of the quick impact projects his own company, Aegis, were delivering in Iraq and then explained that these were not only at the behest of governments but that his company carried out its own aid work - a measure he said helped them operate more readily in the country - and fundraised as a charity to do so.’

No, we don’t.  We set up two charities, in the US and UK, to raise funds for this effort. They fulfil all the requirements of both countries’ regulation of the charity world. They are as much charities as MSF or the RSPCA.  The charities have boards that are mostly made up of people with no Aegis connection.

MSF will be publishing a transcript of the evening where readers may see the full discussion (http://www.msf.org.uk/events_past_events.aspx).

To clarify, the comment about PSCs ‘passing themselves off as charities’ was not intended to suggest that these organisations were dressing as or introducing themselves as charity workers in the field (Dr. Donald stresses that in Aegis’ case their personnel are in Aegis uniform and introduce themselves as contractors working for the US Army Corps of Engineers) but rather that, in fund-raising and carrying out projects of a ‘humanitarian’ nature they are undertaking work which may be perceived as the work of charities.

Hello everyone!

We have some fantastic news - the deadline to submit articles to the Medsin-UK / The Lancet Student magazine collaboration on ‘Power, Politics and Global Health’ has been extended until Friday, August 14th!  Due to a change in the magazine printing deadlines we’ve been able to push back the deadline for your submissions (many thanks to our publication team!).  Given the number of articles we’ve received in the past 2 weeks, I’m sure many of you will welcome the deadline extension!  We’re really impressed with the articles we’ve received so far so please keep them coming…..

We would also like to take a moment to draw your attention to an excellent article that we posted earlier this week on evidence-based medicine and traditional knowledge written by Alessandro Demaio.

Lastly, we would like to say a big thank you to David Humphreys, Sam Liu and Kai Yuen Wong who are currently attending the Asian Medical Students’ Conference in Tokyo, Japan, and have been keeping us up to date on what’s happening there with their blog posts.  Thanks to all of you!

Today we hear from David Humphreys (Australia delegate) and Sam Liu (UK delegate) about their experiences of day 2 of AMSC 2008.

Photo courtesy of Kai Yuen Wong

This morning saw the official opening of the 29th AMSC currently taking place in Tokyo, Japan.

The occasion represented the culmination of nearly two years of hard work and dedication by a remarkable organising committee led by Ms Waka Shibata, a final year medical student from Jichi Medical University. In her welcome message to delegates, Ms Shibata describes the conference academic program as providing “knowledge that cannot be learnt in [medical school] lectures or textbooks.” Delegates will certainly embrace such an approach with open arms.

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Today more than 400 medical students from over 20 countries arrived in Tokyo, Japan to participate in the 29th AMSC hosted by the Asian Medical Students’ Association of Japan. With the help of Kai Yuen Wong who recently did an intern at The Lancet Student and currently part of the UK delegation in Japan, we will be hearing more from the numerous participating countries and delegates as the conference progresses. The theme this year is “Non Communicable Diseases and Health Promotion” and the conference will be held from 25 July – 1 August 2008.

With an extensive program of academic, social and cultural events, ranging from group discussions and paper presentations to field trips and cultural workshops, the conference will certainly be full of many exciting learning opportunities.

Welcoming Party at the National Olympics Memorial Youth Center. Photo courtesy of Kai Yuen Wong.

“It is 1.34am on the first night of AMSC 2008 in Tokyo and I am sat in a lobby area with my fellow paper presenters ardently working on our presentation. It has been an interesting day so far. Finding the venue was a task in itself but amongst the heat, humidity and growing odour of sweat, it was all made worthwhile upon seeing familiar faces of fellow UK delegates as well as previous AMSC faces. This was followed by the icebreaking session, an attempt at breaking barriers between groups of people with only their university course in common. The ice was thawed if not entirely broken, and I believe that as time goes by, the ice will have well and truly melted in the overpowering heat of Tokyo and the passion of the medical students at this conference.” - Joon Soo Ha (UK delegate)

Tomorrow will be the opening ceremony and we will be hearing more soon.

Hello everyone!

This week on The Lancet Student we published a great article by Kendra Wu on avian influenza in Hong Kong. There have also been two blog postings: an opinion piece on how to improve undergraduate medical education, and a fantastic report on Project Muso Ladamunen, an NGO based in Mali.

And a final reminder regarding the Medsin-UK/The Lancet Student collaboration on ‘Power, Politics and Global Health‘…..the deadline for submitting articles is this coming Tuesday, July 31st! We’ve been really impressed with the submissions so far, so we encourage you all to keep sending in your articles.

Students Richard A. Hickman and William Anderson give their thoughts on how to improve undergraduate medical education.

UK undergraduate medical education is forever changing, with some emphasis now shifted away from the preclinical sciences toward subjects such as sociology and communication skills. There are several problems with this modern syllabus. Firstly, most undergraduates get far less teaching now than previously, in biochemistry, physiology and anatomy, with biology practicals significantly curtailed and compulsory dissection not even existing in some institutions. Instead, these students are forced to study predominantly from lectures and books [1,2,3].  The reduction in emphasis of these topics and the limited modalities in which to learn these areas could be partly why some consultants regard medical student’s knowledge more superficial than before [4,5]. Secondly, the lack of exposure to practical research provides little appeal to successfully recruit clinical academics. Such experiences are found in most graduate entry and intercalated students; a minority of UK medical students. Is this lack of awareness another reason for the diminished number of clinical academics? [6]

We are pleased at our own medical schools for providing optional modules/activities in specific preclinical disciplines that allow students to explore these topics in more depth, sometimes with exposure to practicals. In Warwick, dissection is part of the core curriculum of the medical course; Birmingham has dissection as an optional area of study. WA found it was dissection that he found most useful in learning anatomy; similar views are heard in those who choose to dissect in Birmingham [7].

We believe an expansion of biomedical science teaching with more practical elements is necessary to improve the confidence of our clinical teachers. Such implementation could improve undergraduate knowledge of relevant preclinical science and entice more students to select an academic career, thus sustaining the next generation of future medical education.

Richard A. Hickman, BMedSc (Hons.)
5th year intercalated medical student, University of Birmingham, UK
RXH422@bham.ac.uk

William Anderson, BSc (Hons.)
2nd year graduate entry medical student, University of Warwick, UK

All authors declare no conflicts of interest.

1.  Turney BW. Anatomy in a modern medical curriculum. Ann R Coll Surg Engl. 2007. 89(2):104-7.

2.  Weatherall DJ. Science in the undergraduate curriculum during the 20^th century. Med Educ. 2006;40(3):195-201.

3.  Burton JL, Underwood J. Clinical, educational, and epidemiological value of autopsy. Lancet. 2007 369:1471-80.

4.  Waterston SW, Stewart JJ. Survey of clinician’s attitudes to the anatomical teaching and knowledge of medical students. Clin Anat. 2005; 18(5):380-4.

5.  McKeown PP, Heylings DJ, Stevenson M, McKelvey KJ, Nixon JR, McCluskey DR. The impact of curricular change on medical students’ knowledge of anatomy. Med Educ. 2003. 37(11):954-61.

6.  Aldridge J, Fitzpatrick S. Clinical academic staffing levels in UK medical schools. URL:  http://www.chms.ac.uk/documents/ClinicalAcademicStaffSurvey2008-Medicine_001.pdf

7.  Heetun M. Anatomy dissection: RIP? sBMJ. 2007, 15:45-88.

Joshua Schulman-Marcus writes about Project Muso Ladamunen, an NGO based in Mali that he is involved in.

Over the past few months, I have been privileged to join a group of young Americans on the board of Project Muso Ladamunen.  I thought that readers of The Lancet Student might be interested in learning about our ongoing work in the West African country of Mali

Project Muso works with Malian colleagues in Yirimadjo, a peri-urban community on the outskirts of the capital Bamako.  The primary focus of our work has been to empower women through an education/literacy program, health services and literacy, professional training, access to microfinance, and health education.  These numerous elements are rooted in a philosophy that escaping the “trap” of extreme poverty requires a comprehensive approach.  In order to achieve early successes, we have been in frequent consultation with our advisers from Partners in Health and the Harvard School of Public Health.  Additionally, we recently deepened our collabration with a well-regarded NGO Tostan.  Likewise, our microfinance program has proved so popular that we are working to expand the number of loans so that women can establish their own business enterprises in fields such as hairdressing and traditional fabric-dying.

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